Retrieving black money may revive economy: FICCI

Panaji: The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has said retrieving black money from abroad could be one of the solutions to bring economy back on track.

"FICCI has given a 12-point agenda to the (former) Finance Minister (Pranab Mukherjee) to revive economy, which has this issue of repatriation of the money (sic)," FICCI President R V Kanoria said while addressing an annual general body meeting of the Goa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) last evening.

He said the issue of repatriation of black money from abroad without asking the countries to disclose the identity of the depositor could bolster economy which is in doldrums. Few countries like Germany have entered into an agreement with Switzerland to get back their money, he added. "From year 1991, country`s economy has been growing. I fail to understand why our situation is back to the years before 1991," Kanoria said.

Appealing to the Centre to work towards lifting up the overall negative sentiment, he said, "While on one side there is poor performance of the union government, there is rise of independent states that are outperforming other states".

Ruing that the economy which has the potential to grow in double-digit is currently in a disarray, he said the fiscal deficit is widening and the current borrowings have risen to 20 per cent of GDP from 10 per cent earlier. He also supported the Goods and Service Tax (GST), saying the imposition of the same will double up per capita income.